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Theme Parks!
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| Wishes nighttime spectacular in the Magic Kingdom. This was taken in December, when the castle is lit by the castle lights... |
es•cap’ism (-iz'm) n. a tendency to escape from reality, responsibilities, etc, through the imagination.
Welcome to my definition of a Theme Park.
We're not talking about amusement parks, or thrill ride parks, or any type of Six Flags type park. If you had to press me for the difference, I'd have to say that Theme Park attractions (for the most part) tell a story, or are a part of a story, or put you into a story.
Theme Parks also hide the dirty, underbelly of the amusement park industry (unless that's what they intend to show you,) and cover it up with enough stage dressing to let your imagination dictate how much you want to believe. For instance, take Cindy's Castle. Is it real? Well, yes, it's there, it might be made of fiberglass and not masonry, but it looks real enough. But is it really Cinderella's Castle? That depends on whether or not you believe it's Cinderella's Castle...
I will admit, the Theme Park experience is a bit more expensive than say, a weekend camping in your back yard, but if you know how to control the costs, it's not that terrible, either. Unless you want it to be. But you do generally get what you pay for.
I would also admit that Theme Parks are also shopping malls with some rides thrown in. I once joked that "The shopping opportunities to the square footage ratio must be one of the highest in the country." But I'm aware of that going in, so it doesn't bother me. (A legal disclaimer should be put here that I don't have kids, either. Other than me...)
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| The Hard Rock Hotel at Universal Orlando |
I had been to Disneyland for a day in 1969. I was at Disneyworld in 1977 for a week, but after being in the Magic Kingdom for a couple of days, the adventure turned into travelling from the Contemporary (where I was staying) to the Polynesian to sample the different exotic adult beverages. After all, there were no other parks at the time, and Disneyworld was still on a ticket system, so if you really liked the E-ticket rides, things got expensive in a hurry. (At least I'm *pretty* sure they were on a ticket system. I could be wrong, but that was 30 years ago. :-)
Along comes 2000, and I'm in Orlando on business. The natural thing to do was Disneyworld. I came as a cynic, and I left impressed. After doing a lot of research, and figuring out the cost/benefits of how to do Disneyworld, I found it wasn't that much more expensive than any of my *other* vacations.
Since that time, I've been to Central Florida more times
than I care to admit. To this day, the parks are still my favorite
places to go to just relax, and escape from reality for a few days.
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There are five main parks I have pictures of. (Okay, 4.5, since I don't
have many pictures of Seaworld, but I do have a lot of HD video. Then there's
Disneyland and Kennedy Space Center... But I digress.)
We'll visit them in the order I did.
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'Course, good ol' Uncle Walt is given the credit for inventing the Theme Park, and the Disney Company has made sure that the Disney brand stays the elite of the genre. And for the past 50 years, they have. In that time, Disneyland has been joined by a second Theme Park, three hotels and a nightclub/shopping area, now known as Disneyland Resort. I was at Disneyland Resort in September 2005, as part of my Desert Southwest Vacation but is broken out here, because, well, it's a Theme Park. There is also a page of 59 pictures from my 1969 trip. |
| Walt Disney World is a destination unto itself. Four Theme Parks, two nightclub areas, five golf courses, two miniature golf courses, two water parks and more resort hotel rooms than you can shake a stick at. It's the undisputed king of vacation resorts, and with good reason. They can provide an experience unmatched anywhere else in the world. |
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Universal Orlando is Disneyworld's biggest competition in Orlando. Islands of Adventure, one of the two Theme Parks here, is an equal to any Disney park in America in terms of themeing, attractions, food and ambiance. Anyway, with two Theme Parks, three on-site hotels (run by Loews Hotels) and a nightclub venue, it's more like Disneyworld than anything else East of the San Andreas Fault. |
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Seaworld is a venue I only went to because
a friend wanted to go there. It's a day trip, and if you've never been to a
Seaworld, it's an interesting experience. They too, like Universal, has to
compete with Disney, so there's a lot of Disneyesque type venues, but underneath
it all, it's a bunch of creatures that have a lot of learned behaviors. Just like us.
There's also a page on Marineland of the Pacific from 1969, which is vaguely, sorta connected to Seaworld... |
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Kennedy Space Center is the real deal. It's history, it's facts, and it's deals more with reality than any other theme park in Florida. But in the end, reality never could compete with Fantasy and Thrill Rides. |
The section on Theme Park Trip Reports can now be found here.
Tips on photography in the parks that used to be here, can now be found here.
12/25/2010 - 2010 Trip report added
01/14/2011 - Photographing the parks section moved
07/22/2011 - Page redesigned, moved Trip Reports to their own page